Why We Don't Do Summer Reading at the Public Library

I'm a children's librarian currently writing a textbook about successful summer reading programs at the public library, and yet my own preschooler and toddler don't participate. Why not? Read on for my five main reasons!

We don't need the motivation. 

My kids, who are the children of two book-loving librarians, absolutely love to read and listen to stories. In their short lives, they have already developed an intrinsic desire to spend time with books just for the pleasure it brings. Books are part of their play, their bedtime routine, their relationship to their grandparents, and even their friendship with each other. These days, summer reading programs are designed to target students who might fall victim to "summer slide" and families with "reluctant readers." Since my kids are neither of these, I don't usually see much that the local summer reading program can offer them.

The goals are too easy. 

Most of our local libraries have very low expectations for the number of books they want kids to read in a summer. Often, we read in a typical day the number of books the libraries want us to read throughout the entire summer! I understand that the goals are designed to appeal to people who may not read to their children at all, but if this is the case, then the program isn't for my family anyway.

Not much reading is involved. 

Some libraries don't expect you to read at all with kids under 5, but instead ask them to complete "early literacy activities" like singing the ABCs during a diaper change (which I assume is a suggestion written by someone who has never changed a poopy toddler) or visiting the firehouse (which does not necessarily involve literacy, but was one of the choices at a local library last summer). While the literacy activities are a nice idea, they are not what I am looking for when I seek out a reading-focused program for kids. My three-year-old is starting to sound out words; I can't imagine it would be a lot of fun for her to revert back to memorizing the alphabet, especially when she could be poring over a picture book and picking out the words she recognizes.

The record-keeping is too tedious. 

Last summer, at least one library system expected me to keep track of not just the titles of the books I read to the girls, but to also report how many minutes it took to read each one. I know I probably could have made a good guess about each book based on its length, but it seemed like such a ridiculous thing to ask me to do that I just decided we wouldn't do the program. Libraries are also starting to keep track of progress online, which is convenient, but not terribly appealing to my screen-free preschooler and toddler. They never get to see the badges they accumulate, and often the badges require me to tailor my reading choices to specific categories. It's too much to keep track of, especially when we don't really need to be encouraged to keep reading.

We don't need (or want) the prizes. 

Since my kids already love to read and see it as its own reward, I see no reason to introduce them to the concept of reading for prizes. Sure, it might be nice to win a new book, which is sometimes an option, but the choices are usually either books we already have, or books I would let into my house only over my dead body. Other prizes tend to be things we'll never use, like baseball tickets, or plastic toys, of which we just don't need any more. When I was a kid, I was content to have a sticker to add to my reading log for each book, and maybe a pencil to take home at the end of the summer. I like that simplicity much more than the flashier things they want to give kids now - and a program that simple I can always design myself.

Do your kids do summer reading at the library?  What's the program like in your community?